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Is it Worth it to Build an NFC App Right Now?

One of the biggest technologies to sweep the mobile industry looks more like magic — and it has a lot of big names chasing its imagination capturing abilities. You probably remember the first time you saw Near Field Communication, or NFC, in action: A swift tap against a sensor yields an instantaneous result, faster than a barcode scan.

It sure seems like the technology for the future, and it's undeniable that major companies such as Google are placing big bets for NFC to become the next global standard for everything from payment transactions to easy data transfer between devices. But, not all is set in stone, and NFC's still-nascent presence in tech means that it's a big gamble.

So, is it worth it? Mashable spoke with experts from a variety of industries to get a better handle on when you should develop an NFC app — and when to leave the technology on the shelf.

When to Say Yes

"NFC is really, so far, the only technology available on smartphones that can secure a transaction. It's important to understand that on the NFC phone, the chip acts in the same way a credit card does, securing the transaction without going online."

"The sheer volume of devices that will be shipped with NFC this year and the coming years provides the greatest potential platform for the next big thing. The challenge is now in the hands of the major mobile players and application developers as to what they will do with it."

— Jeff Miles, Vice President Mobile Transactions Worldwide at NXP, a hardware company specializing in chipsets related to NFC transactions.

"One of the things we used NFC for in the beginning is downloading applications. Companies can spend tens of thousands of dollars on an app, but the biggest challenge is to get users to download it. What we can do is, with a simple tap, drive awareness and drive the actual application download."

— Mikhail Damiani, CEO/Co-Founder of Blue Bite, a media company specializing in NFC poster outreach programs for major companies.

"At this point, we are encouraging our customers to adopt NFC in everything from healthcare to fitness. Think about it: it's an opportunity to not have to scan barcodes anymore if machines can know exactly what is inside it quickly. Eventually if we can get to the point where it knows when many things are nearby, that will be an improvement."

— George Guffy, head of user experience at PDT, a product development company specializing in cutting edge technology for home and retail.

When to Put on the Brakes

"Unfortunately, a lot of NFC is hype, rather than relevance or practice. Devices that folks use have to have NFC in order for it to really take off. Apple has made a conscious choice not to put NFC in their iPhones, and that's arguably the most popular device out there. That says a lot about the space."

"Retail penetration and adoption is the biggest barrier. It's really about getting the presence out in the market, along with remote provisioning to the application, so the device can activate NFC when on the road."

"The Bump user experience is very similar to NFC, where you can bump two devices and connect, but we took the opposite philosophy with NFC. NFC is a hardware-based system, and it's difficult to work with in a scalable way for a startup."

So … Is it Worth it?

"Actually, I think today it's absolutely worth it to invest in NFC because it will become the main technology to perform transactions in the future. We need to start investing in NFC."

— Jeremie Leroyer

"When you view NFC as a complementary technology, rather than a technology on its own, you start to see how powerful it really is."

— Jeff Miles

"I think that all electronics companies should consider NFC, because people want the ease. I think we're going to be focusing on NFC in the home — if tea or coffee bags were tagged and you had a drink machine that could know exactly what you're brewing, there's opportunity. It's an ease of use that I think people will really go for."

— George Guffy

"Currently the industry is going down the path of coupons etc., but once NFC has bigger presence on the mobile devices, the more adoption and the more apps will be out there, making it easier to not have to carry a wallet full of cards and cash."

— Stefan Rust

"The only time it's worth it to develop an [NFC] app is if the app serves something outside of that initial experience. Think of a Google Wallet, where you need that NFC application to make mobile payments without a browser. There's a function in that application that you can't imitate in just a pure web browser."

— Mikhail Damiani

"The hype is much bigger than the current reality. I don't have a crystal ball into what the next couple of years will look like, but it might not make sense to develop an app based upon the really slow adoption rate."

— Daryl Colwell

"What I always stress to people is to think about what user experience you want to provide, and then use the technology to find a way to do that. What I hate to see is people saying, 'Hey, there's NFC on this Android phone now! What can we do with it?' I think that's a bad way to approach your product — start with the user first."

Mashable
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